Sending photos and video from Tiller shooting scene
We’ve had a few blog posts lately about how the nature of our jobs have changed. The shooting death of Dr. George Tiller on Sunday exemplified that change more than anything.
The only aspect of our coverage that resembled how we’ve covered news in the past was our response. We quickly had three members of our photo staff at Reformation Lutheran Church. Fernando Salazar walked the perimeter taking still photos. Jaime Oppenheimer shot video and stills across the street from the church’s entrance. Mike Hutmacher shot both at Tiller’s clinic. I backed Jaime up, shot video of a police briefing and spent most of the day under a tree sending all of that information back to the newsroom and directly to Kansas.com.
Photo by Travis Heying
Perhaps the biggest difference though, was how we used social media to inform the public about what was happening at the scene.
The Wichita Eagle’s Ron Sylvester has pioneered the use of Twitter as a reporting tool, using it to send live “tweets” from trials that he’s covered. Over the course of the day on Sunday, people who use twitter were able to get up-to-the-minute information from the scene by following our account, @EaglePhotos. Here are a few examples:
@EaglePhotos: Police looking for a 90′s era light blue Ford Taurus with Kansas tags. Registered in Merriam, Ks.
@EaglePhotos: 225-BAB is the tag on the vehicle police are looking for. Kansas tags.
@EaglePhotos: http://twitpic.com/6cqug - Friend of Dr. George Tiller places flowers outside of Reformation Lutheran Church. #tiller
One of the more enjoyable aspects of being a journalist is revisiting stories you’ve covered in the past.
For me personally, one of the highlight of my career as a photojournalist was documenting the births of Ethan, Melissa, Grant, Sean, Jaycie and Danielle Headrick on April 6, 2002.
Six babies, all born within two and a half minutes of one another. Wow.
Over the last seven years, I’ve checked in periodically with the Headricks. It never ceases to amaze me how fast they grow. Every time I see them though, I’m reminded of that amazing few months in 2002.
The Headrick sextuplets: 2009
Check out Kansas.com and the Wichita Eagle this Sunday for an update on the kids, their sister Aubrianna and their parents, Eldon and Sondra. You can see a video, a photo gallery and read a story from Suzanne Perez Tobias. I hope you’ll check it out.
If you’re a member of social media sites like Facebook or Twitter, and you have an interest in photography, you’ve probably discovered there’s a strong network of Wichitans with a passion for photography.
Wichita PD detective Ken Davis, and Heroes bar manager Darrin Hackney (now there’s an unlikely duo) are using social networking to try and get as many shutterbugs out and about as they can this Saturday.
The two have organized a “Photo Walk” and they’re hoping that anyone with an interest in photography joins them.
Ken describes it this way on his blog: “Here’s how it works: You simply walk around with a group of people and take photos. It’s that easy! Take pics of whatever interests you or anything cool you see. Take pics of buildings, people, colors, textures, shapes, patterns, etc. I might even bring a list of ideas just to get you started.”
Any skill level and any camera type is welcome. Blow the dust of your Polaroid. Bring your fancy digital SLR. Even a disposable camera would be welcome. The photos above and below are from past photo walks.
Photo by Ken Davis
Here are the details:
Date: Saturday May 23rd
Time: 9 AM to 11 AM
Where: The Delano District
The walk meets in the north end of the Lawrence Dumont Stadium parking lot and will make its way to Douglas.
This time-lapse of artist Cary Clawson was done over the course of five days at Bishop Carroll High School. Photographer Bo Rader mounted a camera in the rafters of the gym and triggered it using a device called an intervalometer. As Clawson painted the school’s mascot on the floor, the camera fired a frame once every two minutes. More than 2900 pictures were taken. That entire selection was then turned into a short movie using QuickTime.
Running a story this weekend about Bobby Rozzell. He’s the mastermind behind www.douglasandmain.wordpress.com. Douglas and Main is a blog that keeps track of other personal and professional blogs in Wichita.
Last week I met Bobby at the intersection of Douglas and Main (where else?) to shoot his portrait.
Photo #1 has a bit of glare issue, but I like the way the headlight make a nice rimlight.
Photo #2 corrects that problem, but is it too stale?
Photo #3 is an attempt at a little juxtaposition with the statue and newspaper.
Photo #4 is a different look entirely.
Would love to hear your opinion. What photo would you choose? Why? What would you have done differently?
Our photo department has had a few new faces running around this week. Kansas Sate photographers Matthew Binter, Matt Castro, Nathaniel LaRue and Chelsey Lueth took a few days of their spring break to work at the Eagle. I love having these kids around and I’m very proud of the way they came in a went to work. Why? I was once one of them.
In 1984, former Eagle director of photography Steve Harper took a chance on me when I was a K-State student. The experiences that I had at K-State was incredible and helped form the foundation on how I go about my business today. I can tell these students are getting the same experience.
Yesterday was sort of a wacky day in the Eagle. A horrible car accident that killed a Sedgwick teen, a bank robbery and a plane crash were all covered by the K-State students. Today’s Local and State section has a nice photograph by Nathaniel from the car crash scene, an event that’s not easy to photograph. He did well, not only his photos, but the way he treated people visiting the scene.
Chelsey shot some beautiful photos of a Habitat for Humanity build. Her photos dominated the section and provided a nice slide presentation on Kansas.com. Matt shot the plane crash and did a great job showing the plane and the emergency workers at the scene. Matthew shot a bank robbery and had the lead photo on page 1 of the new arena. Not only did they shoot for the newspaper, but three of the four ended up as my subjects for a teen driving illustration that ran on page 1.
Although it’s been over 25 years since I was in their shoes, I still know the feeling of trying to absorb as much as possible while working as an intern. All four of them went above and beyond in the few short days they were here.
Sometimes it seems we’re undergoing an identity crisis on the photo staff of the Wichita Eagle.
Shoot Video for the web? Shoot photos for the paper?
Photographer Jaime Oppenheimer decided to melt both mediums into one piece of multimedia delight for this story on prom fashions. Using her camera’s motor drive to its fullest potential, Jaime takes you through 600 prom dress photos in just over a minute.
Well, my Big 12 Tournament stay was brief. Kansas and Kansas State both lost and I’m off to Topeka early in the morning to shoot the 5A Kansas State Basketball Tournament. This blog a way for the readers to kind of see what and how we cover these tournaments. As you can see, traveling usually plays into it and Friday will be no different, thank God for XM radio!
Today was really no different than the rest of the tournaments that I have covered over the last 25 years, but each one usually brings a new challenge, this one was a little tougher than most. Kansas and Kansas State played in the first and second games of the day, 30 minutes between each game. It sort of calls for double duty and a little more stress than normal.
My day started with coffee, sorry, without my coffee you get no photos! I usually arrive at least two hours before the game starts, so this morning I arrived at the Ford Center in Oklahoma City at about 9 a.m. After clearing security with my camera cases, I checked the shooting space for my assigned shooting spot. This is where you see all of those people on the floor with big white lenses that are crammed in the space like sardines in a tin. At that point I set up my remote cameras. These cameras, usually one or two, are positioned on the floor with a wide angle lens and fired with a radio remote. I always have one on the floor with a real wide lens, like a 16 mm. I put it in places that my bosses would probably not like to see, but it has to be there for the best photo. In my KU and KSU gallery on Kansas.com, you can see the pictures I get from those remotes.
I use a 70-200mm lens on another camera for the action around the closest basket and I use a 300mm lens for the action at the other end. My ISO is usually high, around 1600 or higher so that I can shoot a shutter speed of at least 1/500th of second. My cameras are fast sports-type digital SLRs. I shoot quite a bit during a game, maybe 200-300 shots on each camera. I’ve shot more basketball games than I really want to know, but I’ve always just tried to follow the ball with my focus and anticipate and capture the emotion on the floor and bench. In basketball, my theory is simple: Someone wins and someone loses, and it all happens inside painted lines on a wood floor.
Shooting the game is only half of the battle for a newspaper photographer. I look at the images from each camera at the half and at the end of the game. I select the keepers, crop them, tone them, write a caption about each photograph, create a photo gallery for Kansas.com and send it all back to the newspaper before deadline.
It makes for a long day, but I like basketball and I love photography. Friday will be no different in Topeka. Saturday has not even been discussed yet, but I would bet that I’ll be shooting a basketball game somewhere, if not I will be at Eck Stadium for Wichita State baseball. Now that is my true love, shooting baseball rocks, but that is another blog down the road.
The madness of March is here and it’s probably my favorite and craziest times of year. I look forward to it, but I’m always glad when it’s over. Last year was special and nutty, the Jayhawks kept me away from home for most of March and part of April. This year I’m covering the Kansas State Wildcats, as long as they win I will stay here in Oklahoma City. If they lose I will be back in Kansas ASAP to help shoot high school hoops. Both are good gigs, the same game, just a smaller arena.
I shot my first NCAA tournament for the Wichita Eagle in 1988. I’ve not missed too many in the years between then and now. This blog is new for you and it’s certainly new for me, but tomorrow I will try to walk you through a day of covering one of my favorite basketball events, the Big 12 Tournament.
Check out our galleries on Kansas.com and enjoy our images from the all of the tournaments that we cover.
Jerry Clark. The Godfather of the Wichita Eagle photo staff
Welcome to The Wichita Eagle photography staff blog.
“More Than Meets the Eye” is a place where you can join us in discussions about photojournalism and photography in general. We’ll discuss visual communication and visual literacy and how our photography staff works. No topic is off limits, just as long as it’s associated with photography or photojournalism. We hope this blog can become a place where anyone who enjoys or practices photography can come and find something useful or fun.
There have been numerous changes in the way news organizations deliver visual information over the past few years. We’ll talk about how we gather, edit and publish visual and audio content to our customers. But that’s just the beginning.
We’re eager to introduce you to our staff and more importantly we hope to hear from you. Questions, comments and ideas for future blog entries are welcome. Expect links to other blogs, websites and articles about photography.
Want to follow us more closely, check us out on Twitter: www.twitter.com/EaglePhotos
And, of course, we’ll post photos. Lots of Photos
Many thanks to Wichita ocularist Jim Henthorn of Henthorn Ocular Prosthetics for the use of his spare prosthetic eyeballs in our blog header. Here’s looking at you, Jim.
